Generally, an automated teller machine (ATM) for financial services is an automated machine which can assist in basic financial services such as deposits or withdrawals anytime and anywhere without the need for interaction with bank staff, and which is configured to allow a customer to automatically perform financial transactions such as bill or check withdrawals or deposits using an ATM card or a bankbook.
Depending on financial transactions with customers, the ATM is operated as follows: when a deposit transaction is performed, the ATM receives bills or checks through an deposit/withdrawal unit, separates the bills or checks one by one, transfers and stacks them to and in a temporary storage unit, and then transfers, when the deposit transaction is authorized, them to a cassette and stores them in the cassette; and when a withdrawal transaction is performed, the ATM separates bills or checks stored in the cassette one by one and transfers and provides them to a customer through the deposit/withdrawal unit.
Here, the ATM includes the deposit/withdrawal unit in which media sheets (bills or checks) are stacked, and a media separation apparatus which separates media sheets (bills or checks) stacked in the temporary storage unit or the cassette one by one and transfers them.
FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a media separation apparatus for an ATM according to a conventional technique.
FIG. 1 illustrates the structure of a media separation apparatus disclosed in Korean Patent Unexamined Publication No. 2015-0049272, as an example of the media separation apparatus according to the conventional technique. The media separation apparatus according to the conventional technique includes a pick-up roller 21 configured to come into close contact with one of stacked media sheets 10 and pick up it, a feed roller 22 configured to transfer the media sheet 10 picked up by the pick-up roller 21 in a media transfer direction, and a separation roller 23 which is disposed facing the feed roller 22 with the media sheets 10 disposed therebetween and is configured to separate, from the media sheet 10 that is being transferred by the feed roller 22, another media sheet 10 that is brought into close contact with and transferred along with the media sheet 10 that is being transferred by the feed roller 22.
Here, a pick-up element (not shown) is provided on a portion of an outer circumferential surface of the pick-up roller 21 and configured to come into contact with a media sheet 10 and pick up the media sheet 10 using sufficient frictional force between it and the media sheet 10 to transfer the media sheet 10.
In the media separation apparatus having the above-mentioned configuration, the pick-up roller 21 successively picks up the stacked media sheets 10 one by one and transfers it to the feed roller 22. During a process of transferring the media sheet 10 using the feed roller 22, the separation roller 23 which is stationary or is rotated in a direction opposite to that of the feed roller 22 separates, from the media sheet 10 that is being transferred by the feed roller 22, another media sheet 10 that is brought into close contact with and transferred along with the media sheet 10 that is being transferred by the feed roller 22. In this way, the media sheets 10 can be transferred one by one by the feed roller 22 to a transfer path 30.
However, the conventional media separation apparatus is not provided with a separate media alignment unit. Thus, during the process of picking up and transferring the media sheet using the pick-up roller, a front edge of a media sheet disposed subsequent to the media sheet that is picked-up and transferred cannot be correctly aligned to a position an entrance between the feed roller and the separation roller. Therefore, if the stacked media sheets are skewed, a skewed media sheet is inserted into the space between the feed roller and the separation roller as it is, during a media separation process, whereby an error may occur during a following bill read process, or a bill jamming phenomenon on the transfer path may be caused during a transfer process.